Countdown
by BadAddy
Summary: Willow is awaiting her impending doom... X-over with HP. W/Draco, W/Snape, W/Harry (depending on how you look at it)


Title: Countdown

Author: Addy (BadAddy2004@hotamil.com)

Pairing: W/Harry, W/Draco, W/Snape… I should add the words 'sorta kinda' behind all of these. Oh hell, if you like any of these pairings, just read it.

Summary: Willow is awaiting her impending doom… 

Note: If you hadn't guessed, this is a BtVS/HP X-over. First timer, so lemme know what you think. Should there be a sequel? 

Oh, Harry & Co. are 18 years old.

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10 minutes and 42 seconds. That's how long Willow had until her life, as she knew it, was over.

41 seconds…

40…

39…

She forced herself to look away from her watch and ignore its ticking. An idea began to develop inside her head; if worse came to worst, she could always convince Hermione to rewind time for her, to give her another chance against…

But she may as well have performed the Obliviate curse on herself. Before the idea even fully formed, she made it vanish, and for good reason. She had worked with the board of teachers at Hogwarts to decide if Hermione could handle the responsibility of such a timepiece. Willow had been skeptical at first, but Hermione had proven herself time after time when she was tested. One of the test was to make share she would never, *never* rewind the time for *anyone* except herself, and for *anything* except classes. Hermione, of course, had passed with flying colors. And that left Willow out of luck. Not to mention, she'd have to *live* through this… experience… if she ever wanted the chance to redo it.

8 minutes and 27 seconds. Another not-so-subtle glance at her watch warned Willow that time was running out.

26…

25…

24…

'I'm too young for this to happen to me.' she groaned to herself silently. After all, she was only eighteen. Granted, she'd lived through a lot – vampires (Spike, Dru, Angelus, Darla, and any other random vamp that wanted a bite), demons, werewolves, an intended Apocalypse or two – but this would undoubtedly be the worst she had faced yet. 

She wished her Sunnydale friends could be there. Especially Buffy. Buffy always had the best quips and quotes and phrases when dealing with the enemy, and Willow needed that more than anything. And Xander could make anyone laugh; distraction, whether to keep Willow from thinking of her impending doom, or to keep the enemy from focusing its energies, may have been the best strategy.

But they were part of the reason she was here. She had seen the future, where she had a girlfriend… Tara… Willow shook her head. After Tara… died, she would hurt them so much. She would hurt herself so much. Giles had brought her to England with him, to give her time to cope with her future, and hopefully to prevent it. She had gotten in contact with several witches while she was there, and when she returned to Sunnydale, she received a letter by owl…

And here she was.

6 minutes.

No. Oh God no.

They were early.

One by one, wizards Apperated all around her. So many, SO many of them had green and silver on their robes. Slytherins. She knew they would be, Dumbledore *told* her they would be. The female Slytherins muttered amongst themselves, arms crossed, eyes so narrowed by their frowning faces that they appeared to be only slits.

Oh. This was gonna be so much fun.

One of the girls… Pansy?… practically growled at her.

Oh yeah. Definitely. Just without the fun part.

3 minutes and 13 seconds.

The Slytherins were suddenly silenced. Willow looked up from her watch. What could possibly have silenced…

Their leader. Great. Just peachy.

With his pale, white skin, she might have taken him for a vampire if she hadn't known better. He certainly carried himself like one; he held himself as if the world were at his feet. Which it was. And damn if she didn't find that attractive. Which she did. 

She rolled her eyes at herself. Of course, she *had* to go and decide that the enemy was attractive. She comforted herself with the thought that, at least, it hadn't been her decision; genetics had played a larger role in the verdict than she had. Well, genes probably hadn't toned those muscles that she could see through his robes as he glided towards his clique, but they were definitely responsible for those silvery eyes of his. Piercing, steely eyes that could probably see straight into her soul…

And which were now staring directly into her eyes, sizing her up. She felt the need to straighten up, fix her clothes, do *something,* but instead forced herself to settle for a cool look. She was now incredibly grateful for knowing Spike and Angelus. Ok… maybe grateful was the wrong word, but at least they had, albeit unknowingly, prepared her to face someone terribly handsome and completely against her.

If he had come to any conclusion about her after staring her down, his face didn't betray it. Only one motion played out on his structured features. A wink.

She merely arched an eyebrow before turning away, straight into another man's chest. Severus Snape had arrived. 

She knew perfectly well why he was there, but it was perfectly unclear which side he would be on. Would he be helping her or hurting her?

"Severus."

"Willow." His voice, as always, seemed to have the unique ability of reverberating in her ears, then somehow coursing through the rest of her body, and sluicing down her spine. Not at all unpleasant, but always uncalled for. She squeezed her eyes shut, breaking eye contact. God, she needed to get a grip.

1 minute and 54 seconds. And counting.

With the added weight of Snape's enigmatic stare, Willow felt as if she were on the verge of just acquiescing defeat until a snowy white owl swooped down from the open window. It landed gracefully on her shoulder and dropped a letter into her waiting hand.

Willow~

Some of the Gryffindor young men had a change of heart, and should arrive in time. Seems that seeing you in the flesh at the banquet changed their minds. Good luck.

~Minerva McGonagall

Willow's face broke into a nervous smile. She had only expected Harry Potter to come and aid her, but the more wizards here that weren't out to get her, the merrier. As said young men began appearing, however, the smile became a little more forced. What if this just complicated things further?

1 minute.

59 seconds…

58…

57…

What was done was done, anyhow. But where was Harry? He should be here by now. Hell, he should have been here early. He knew what was coming.

Then she heard a soft 'whosh' and felt the tingle she always felt when he appeared, this time with a sheepish grin on his face and apologetic words on his tongue. The look disappeared, just for a moment, when he noticed Draco eyeing her predatorily. He shot Malfoy a look of fury that Malfoy lazily responded to with a cool smirk. Harry could see why he should have gotten there sooner. His contrite expression returned as he quickly walked toward Willow and leaned in to whisper in her ear.

"Sorry," he said quietly. "Didn't mean to be late."

The apology that normally would have melted Willow instantly did not have the same affect when facing certain death. 

"If we live through this, remind me to have a talk with you about punctuality." She grumbled, but the small smile that played on her lips let him know so was only kidding. Mostly, anyway.

This was a good sign. She could still kid around. Maybe she could do this without Buffy and Xander. She raised her watch one final time, taking in the hour hand and the minute hand and the second hand… and the hand that was reaching for hers.

10 seconds.

Harry looked at the time piece, then laced his fingers through her hand and whispered, "I wasn't late after all." He backed up, slowly releasing her hand. His next words, maybe the last words she would hear from him, rang in her ears.

"I've got your back."

And with that, he let go. Willow straightened her back, squared her shoulders, and cleared her throat, ready to face what was coming.

Time was up.

"Class, welcome to the first day of Muggle Studies. I'm Professor Rosenberg, and I will be your teacher for the next year. Mr. Potter, due to his extensive knowledge of the Muggle world, will be my assistant. We will be here, in my house, for the duration of these classes, due to both the availability of Muggle equipment here and the magical energies on the Hellmouth. Those energies will disguise us from any unwanted visitors, and aid you when you practice Apparating. Now, if you'll please take out your notes while I demonstrate the basic uses of electricity…"

She took a breath. O.K. That wasn't so bad. Draco eyeing her in the front of the room, Severus observing her from the back of the room (presumably to evaluate her teaching skills… right?), and Harry right behind her. Three of the most attractive men she knew were watching her teach a bunch of hostile witches and drooling wizards about things they either already knew, didn't want to know, or didn't think they'd use. Hell, the Gryffindor boys that joined at the last minute had Muggle parents and already tested out of the class; they only signed up after seeing her at the banquet. "A chance to get up close and personal with the lovely new professor was just too good to pass up," she had heard one student comment. Right, then. At least Harry, Malfoy, and Snape seemed to share the sentiment, if their presence was any indication. Still, the glares the three were exchanging were almost as bad as the drool. Wonderful.

She looked back at her watch. Just 59 minutes to go…

~Finis~


End file.
